


Speak To Me Only With Your Eyes

by brigitttt



Series: Captive Prince Kink Bingo [5]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: (but in like the sluttiest way possible), (hopefully that's the right way to describe it), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Exhibitionism, Getting Together, M/M, Public Sex, Voyeurism, bites/bruises, handjobs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-29 02:05:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17799056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brigitttt/pseuds/brigitttt
Summary: AU where Pallas and Lazar don’t meet until post-canon. They fuck everyone in a palace-wide radius around them, except for each other. Then they fuck each other by proxy? That’s a natural progression, right?





	Speak To Me Only With Your Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> eternal gratitude to Jay/thatgothlibrarian for holding my hand and giving me the Led Zeppelin title <3

The soldiers baths fill up quite quickly after drills at the palace. Pallas is only just now able to navigate a route from the training rooms to the baths that gets him and his friends there in under six minutes, but there are always, inexplicably, a dozen or so men who’ve already washed and gotten in the baths before them. At least he still arrives before the majority of the cohort.

Today had been endless combat forms under the hot Ios sun, turning his grip sweaty and useless by the end of the afternoon. Still, it’s an unbelievable and electrifying pleasure to be training at the palace directly; his second-oldest brother had been sent to Dice for his training, and while their father had not explicitly spoken of it as a slight disappointment, it had been strongly hinted at, especially when Pallas’ skill had placed him in a clearly superior position at the capital, even under the new reign of Damianos-Exalted. It’s hard work, but it’s an easy bliss to relax beside the marble of the nearest column, sinking under the steam until just his face is above the water. 

The rest of the guards and soldiers stream in, armour put away and chitons recently disposed of, washing the sweat and dust off as quickly as they can before they slip into the large rectangular bath. Aktis finds him soon enough, and after a smiling groan at the warm water on overworked muscles, he shoots Pallas a grin and leans back and toward him, a whimsical expression on his face.

“Have you seen Doreios? And the magnificent bruise he’s sporting?” Aktis unsubtly points over to one of the far corners of the bath, at the man in question, just stepping into the pool. Pallas frowns at his friend initially, but then Doreios is turning, and Pallas is suddenly witness to – not just one bruise, but many, littered over the swell of his ass cheeks. There’s another couple just beneath his shoulder blade too, where his chiton would hide it, but it’s conspicuously clear that these are not bruises from any kind of training practice. Pallas turns back, just as some of Doreios’ friends whistle at the man good-naturedly. 

“So he has a lover. That’s more than you can say,” he says to Aktis, but now Gelon and Halias have waded over.

“Apparently Doreios has been flaunting them ever since he met in not-so-secret with that one guard of the Veretian’s. What was it he told you yesterday,” urges Gelon, and Halias huffs a laugh before imitating the nasal tones of their comrade.

“‘That whatever-his-name really knows how to use his mouth! In every place!’” he says, wagging around his pointer finger. Aktis laughs loudly and splashes the water.

“Does he really not remember this guard’s name?” Pallas asks, reaching for a bottle of scented hair oil near the bath ledge.

“I hope not, otherwise who knows whose name he was moaning!” Gelon erupts into laughter. They dissolve into further ribaldry on the matter, but Pallas dutifully coats his curls with the oil, closing his eyes and tipping forward to the water. He would be sure to remember any lover’s name, he’s certain of it, especially if they happened to be a handsome foreigner. He’s never really lacked for partners, but he’s been so busy from his palace obligations that he’s had little time for anything but quick, practically masturbatory affairs with other guards and soldiers, and nothing in the past three weeks. 

He surreptitiously drags his eyes back over to Doreios, who’s still being teased by his friends. Pallas thinks about the kind of love bites they would’ve had to be to stay this dark for this long, and imagines rough hands on his own hips to keep him still, sharp and direct teeth and sucking lips on his ass and thighs. He feels himself begin to harden, heat pooling low in his groin.

“Not a problem for our Pallas, here, eh?” says Aktis, slapping a hand on Pallas’ shoulder, lurching him out of his thoughts. He wills his hardness away beneath the warm water, and laughs with his friends, asking what they’re on about now.

#

It’s common knowledge that the palace gardens of Ios are kept openly structured for a reason. Akielon sensibilities would never provide the kind of alcoves and cut hedges and trellises that they all hear Arles has no lack of. Pallas has never been to Arles; the war and his training have kept him from setting foot in Vere, but he can admit that he might blush in his youth to see such flagrant displays of – well, even he doesn’t really know what kind of things he might find there. The tales he’s heard all seem very tall, to put it mildly. Lords and their pets, pets with other pets, or even – lords with other lords! His Exalted and the Veretian Prince must have taken advantage of at least _some_ of the more permitting social norms. Surely.

However, the alleged safety in the Ios gardens as a well-trafficked thoroughfare only makes what Pallas sees occurring there even more shocking.

He’s on his way to fetch something for Aktis from the barracks, but all thoughts of what it may have been slide from his mind the moment he chooses the garden path, and walks sharply around a hedge corner. He freezes, and whips back around the hedge, catching his breath. It was only a glimpse, and he knows he’s behaving like a blushing virgin, but he feels like he might spontaneously combust if he saw anything, if he was seen watching anything, if the people he was watching saw him watching them –

Pallas turns to the side to peer through the leaves of hedge, where they thin at the corner. It’s two men; one is definitively Akielon, dark brown skin and stark white chiton and all, a slimmer build than the normal soldier but bearded nonetheless. The other has a much lighter complexion, sandier hair, a sharper nose, and his clothes are like a simplified, neutrally toned version of the garments the Veretian Prince wears. Something in the back of Pallas’ mind whispers that this might be the infamous Veretian guard, the one who bit his way through Doreios, and then Tellias two days later, and then 3 other men before the week was out. If this is the same man, he’s certainly making his mark again. 

A stifled moan from the lovers brings Pallas back to the matter at hand. He shrinks back against the hedge even further, still looking through the gaps in the leaves at the way the two men are intertwined. The Veretian is holding the other man from behind, no space at all between their torsos, their hips; even the back of one knee is being pressed into by the guard. Pallas can’t see the Veretian’s left arm, but his right is snaked around the Akielon’s waist, palming tantalisingly low on his abdomen, obviously feeling and brushing and squeezing through the material of his chiton. The Veretian’s mouth is solidly plastered onto the side of the Akielon’s neck, and the darker man’s head is thrown back in radiant delight, clearly overcome by the sensation. Pallas realises he’s tensely clutching his own chiton in a mirrored grip of the one the Akielon has on the Veretian’s shirt. 

Only a couple more seconds pass before the Veretian detaches from the one spot, laving over the fresh bruise wetly with his tongue, dragging it up his neck to suck on the Akielon’s earlobe. Pallas is too far away to hear what is whispered with the same thick tongue, but it must be overpowering enough to make the Akielon shake, eyelashes fluttering. Or maybe, now that Pallas sees it, it could also have been the Veretian’s hand stroking through fabric, or the way his hips rub forward against the Akielon’s ass. 

The Veretian’s other hand emerges from where it presumably had been holding on at the side, and he reaches to cup under the Akielon’s chin, then further upwards still. His pointer finger disappears into the Akielon’s mouth, and the tempo of the stroking hand increases. Pallas pulls away from the corner, his back to the hedge, safely out of sight. He releases his chiton from his own mindlessly tightened grasp, and brings the same hand up to cover his own mouth. Pallas closes his eyes, breathing slowly through his nose, and like afterimages of bright lights blinking across the back of his eyelids, he pictures the Veretian man giving a last venomous bite to the neck as his partner finishes, gasping roughly against the fingers in his mouth, jerking in the Veretian’s firm hold.

Pallas opens his eyes and waits for the two lovers to quiet until he squints back around the corner. He runs a slightly sweaty hand down his chiton, watching the Akielon pull the Veretian closer over to the bushes before happily sinking to his knees in the dirt. He doesn’t even check around to make sure no one can see. Pallas pushes the heel of his hand down on his own firm cock to will away his hardness yet again, and after a couple more breaths to gather himself, dashes past the hedge to finally go to the barracks.

#

The sands are Pallas’ favourite place to train. He’d won wrestling competitions as a young teen, and flourished under the admittedly expensive instruction he’d received as a gift from his father. Of his siblings, Pallas had had the better build for it, stockier and more robust, but he admits that his mental strategy is not quite up to par. 

He knows the Exalted, Damianos, excels at the sport, with his large, muscular frame and quick mind, but with his wound he’s currently relegated strictly to observation at the palace training sands. The Veretian Prince rarely comes here, preferring the sword training salles and the stables for his sport, but sometimes he’ll come near the end of a round of training to sidle up next to the Exalted, place a hand inconspicuously against the back of his lover’s arm, and gaze imperiously down at whichever pair is practicing at that moment. Once, a month ago, it’d been Pallas in the central ring, grappling with one of the other men, and he’d been able to use the his opponent’s distraction at the Prince’s arrival to gain the upper hand and pin him solidly. Pallas remembers it fondly; afterwards, Damianos-Exalted had laid a warm hand on his still oiled shoulder and praised his technique, his form, his determination.

Pallas surely is determined, because the Exalted is watching from the side again today. The Prince and a couple of his guard had arrived near the beginning of his current match, but he remains focussed as ever, using swift and sure moves to efficiently defeat his opponent. They embrace in the respectful soldier’s fashion after the practice match concludes, and Pallas, perhaps quite unsubtly, turns to see whether his Exalted is there to commend his form again. To his dismay, one of the guards, in fact the one now infamous among most of the palace soldiers, has his own hand on Damianos-Exalted’s shoulder, a salacious grin on his face making him laugh. 

Pallas doesn’t turn back away in time to avoid the shift in the Veretian guard’s gaze over towards him, and he feels his face flush. He shifts on his feet and makes to find another practice partner as soon as possible, but then he hears a deep, commanding voice call out.

“Pallas, is it?”

A thrill shoots down his spine at the sound of his name in his Exalted’s mouth, and he quickly looks back at the sidelines, unconsciously bringing his arm up to put a hand over his heart, a slightly more casual yet nonetheless reverent sign of respect for his ruler. He licks his lower lip before nodding.

“Why don’t you wrestle with Lazar next? He was just saying he’d like to try some moves out, and you’re the best of your cohort in the ring.” Damianos-Exalted smiles after he says this, and Pallas is almost too distracted by the genial encouragement in the tone to see his dimple appear. He knows it’s a command, but the merely suggestive phrasing softens it into something like a proud friend’s praising of his hard work, asking for a demonstration. Pallas’ eyes glance briefly at the newly named guard, and he takes in the sharpness of Lazar’s eyes behind the easygoing expression.

“Yes, Exalted,” Pallas replies with another nod. 

Lazar is already shucking off his clothes before Pallas can really acknowledge it’s happening. He’s dipping a ready hand in the oil at the side when he turns back, and sees him bend over to take off his trousers. Lazar peeks around his arms at Pallas and smirks; Pallas quickly turns back to the oil, his face flushing.

Without making eye contact, Pallas manages to instruct Lazar on how to oil himself down properly, and then they stride over to the sands. Lazar walks very close to Pallas, behind and off to one side, so that his arm almost brushes Pallas’ own. He can almost feel Lazar’s breath when he says something in Veretian, but Pallas has never been that good at languages, so he ignores it and grabs Lazar’s elbow to spin them around to face each other in the ring. 

“Start like this,” he says in Akielon, and pulls Lazar’s hand up to lay on his chest. The fingers on him squeeze a little, but Pallas scoffs and wraps his arms around Lazar’s. “You’ll have to get a better grip than that,” he murmurs.

“Is that so,” says Lazar, with another devilish smile, but Pallas just smiles right back, grabbing Lazar’s wrist, shifting his weight and pivoting to throw Lazar over his shoulder and onto the sand. Lazar stares upside down at him from where he lays, panting slightly from the impact.

“Alright, gorgeous,” he says with renewed determination.

They run slowly through some more moves, and Pallas tries his best to impart his wrestling knowledge in the face of Lazar’s conspicuous attempts at flirting, and even less subtle attempts at foreplay. It seems like he loosens each hold on purpose just so he can smooth a palm over Pallas’ oiled skin, and it spurs Pallas’ memory of watching this man in the gardens nearly every time. He can’t help but think about Lazar’s sword calluses on the skin of his hips, or his toned but narrow shoulders resting along Pallas’ back. Lazar definitely doesn’t have an unfit figure; in fact, it’s quite attractive, perhaps in the way that something new and beautiful can be intriguingly appealing. Pallas can understand what led his fellow men into his arms – what led them to fall under his sharp teeth. 

There’s a move that Pallas makes purely out of muscle instinct, not much later. They’re not really having a match, because if that was the case Pallas would have won several times over already. His first thought after the throw and subsequent pinning of his opponent is that he hopes Damianos-Exalted had been watching, but this is rapidly replaced by the shifting of Lazar underneath him; specifically, the intentional brush of his ass against Pallas’ cock. The move – which ends with the victor on top of his competitor as if mounting from behind – is one that had only holds humourous implications for giggly and hormonal youths, and is held by experts of the sport in purely professional regard, as one efficient for subduing and gaining advantage. Now, though, it’s as if he’s thrown back into his early years, learning the move for the first time and realising just how undeniably sexual it is, but only at the sudden and inelegant touch of cock to lower back. Pallas is soft, of course, but just barely; the easy muscle memory of the basic forms has allowed his mind to wander to Lazar’s frequent activities, ones which Pallas knows, if only indirectly, how proficient he is at them. 

The ass underneath him continues to move, just subtly shifting, as if Lazar might try to find his way out of the hold. Pallas feels himself burning up from the inside with thoughts of the garden, of Lazar and his whole, imploring body, of his Exalted and the others on the sidelines and how Pallas might – he bites down hard on his lip to keep from thinking about how much oil there is between them, how simple it might be to slide his gradually interested cock along the cleft of Lazar’s ass, to begin to press inside without any preamble. 

Lazar lets out a quiet hum from beneath him, and Pallas makes his own inadvertent noise, suddenly releasing his grip and sitting up, backing away. Lazar gets up more slowly, and a sinful smile appears on his face.

“Can you teach me that one?” He says it louder than his previous comments, presumably for the benefit of the rest of the room.

Pallas gulps. He begins to nod, struck mute, but there’s a call from the sidelines: “Go on, Pallas. Teach him how it’s done in Ios!”

There’s only a second’s hesitation before he brings Lazar around to face him again, and then he’s taking Lazar’s forearm, bringing it up to hold his wrist around the inside. He wraps his hand around the back of Lazar’s, squeezing it tighter. Pallas doesn’t dare lift his gaze.

“Hold here, and then –” Pallas taps Lazar’s other hand. “Grip the outside of my tricep.” He drops his arm and relaxes, and it doesn’t take long for Lazar to do as he says. His hand is warm and deliciously solid on Pallas’ arm, and Pallas glances up to find a slightly more serious version of the usually lecherous look on Lazar’s face, mouth a bit more set, eyes deep and careful. Pallas feels himself blush again.

“Then you –” and Pallas has to swallow thickly in his throat before starting again. “Then you let go of the wrist, and wrap around my waist, pulling me this way by my arm.” He shifts in Lazar’s grip to indicate the direction, but it also does the job of telling him how firmly he’s clamped down on Pallas’ tricep. Lazar does the action in gradual parts, ending up with his arm curled around Pallas’ back.

“A . . . little lower, I think,” he says. Lazar moves his arm down. “And a smoother move combination, um, ideally,” Pallas finishes weakly. He knows deep down why this is getting to him so much, and flushes even more at the thought. Lazar makes a low, affirmative noise to let him know he’s ready for more.

“And then, you pull me over, to the side, and swing yourself, uh, _around_ ,” says Pallas, and he can feel Lazar nodding, probably smiling again too. “You know how it ends,” Pallas says roughly, too quiet, and he wishes his voice would cooperate, that this would return to a normal lesson. He can feel the blush all the way down his neck, but that only makes him think about Lazar suddenly tugging him close and biting down, right over his throat, right where the blood is collecting.

Lazar releases his grip all at once, almost making Pallas stumble. “I think I got it,” he says and they return to the starting position. Lazar’s husky, accented Akielon isn’t helping Pallas’ balance.

It still goes slightly slower than the normal pace of the move, but it flows better, Pallas thinks distantly. He’s become kind of hard sometime during this particular lesson, but he only truly becomes dizzy with the feeling when the move finishes, a reversal of before. Lazar holds himself slightly too low to be correct but Pallas is unable to do more than breathe heavily into the sand, propped up on his forearms, his ass excruciatingly close to Lazar’s own length. Pallas isn’t necessarily surprised that his opponent is as hard as he is, but it’s impossible to really process when Lazar rocks his hips minutely, and stretches further forward, closer to Pallas’ ear.

“Do you like that they can see you like this?” he whispers. Pallas somewhat jolts at the sudden reminder that they’re not alone, that everyone can see them in this position. “They can all see how willing you must be for _your_ king,” Lazar continues. “ . . . for _my_ cock.”

Pallas nearly whines at this, but the only concession he makes is to open his lips, pant into the ground. Lazar’s hips haven’t really stopped moving, dragging the wet tip of his cock all around the small of Pallas’ back. He can feel the sudden grin at his ear, the huff of low, breathy laughter, and braces himself for whatever comes next.

“Can you imagine,” says Lazar, and Pallas can feel himself starting to nod. “Taking both your king and me at the same time?”

Pallas’ eyes shoot wide open, even though he can’t remember when they’d closed. He breaks the hold – it wasn’t ever strong enough to really contain him – and brings a knee up to stand, although somewhat shakily. 

He meets Lazar’s eyes before they do the final, customary soldier’s clasp of shoulders, and Pallas vaguely registers the scattered, sporting claps from their audience as they part. He can’t hide his obvious arousal from them, but it’s not that big a deal; who hasn’t gotten hard in the thick of a match once or twice. Pallas averts his eyes from where Lazar is cockily making his way to the rest of the Veretian entourage and the Exalted, and drags his feet over to his friends. He’ll laugh off their jokes like always, and make fun of the next poor man in the ring along with them, but he won’t look back at Lazar. Pallas won’t even glance at the hair on his thighs, the hair that he’d touched not a minute ago, or the angles of his hands as he scrapes the oil off his body. He won’t take another look at the quirk of his mouth as he collects his clothes. Not even at the casual swing of his arms as he leaves the room.

#

Maiandros uses his momentum to swing Pallas around the corner by his hand, only stumbling a little over his feet on the marble floor of the hallway. Pallas giggles, partly from the drink they’d had at the feast, and partly from how silly they both are right now, trying to walk a straight line down to whoever’s bed is closer. The feast had been food-filled and merry, but he’d met Maiandros’ eyes across the way and they’d smiled at each other in that way they’d nearly perfected, and the feast had become less of a priority. 

Pallas loses his footing on the flat surface for real this time, and collapses into a pillar at the end of the T-shaped hallway; left goes to his barracks, he thinks, or was it right? All he knows is that Maiandros is still at the end of his hand, their fingers laced closely together. Pallas pulls him into his body, off-kilter with spirits and griva, so that Maiandros can press him back harder into the pillar, cage him off from the rest of the palace. 

Pallas might call him a lover, but they certainly don’t do this frequently enough to merit a label as anything more. Maiandros is only a year older, but he’s taller and broader than Pallas; he doesn’t talk a lot but they do laugh together, especially after festivities and drinking. It’s easy and it’s pleasant, and Pallas can’t think of anything else at the moment. Maiandros grins into a wet kiss, and Pallas smiles back into one in return, sliding their tongues together and wrapping his arms around Maiandros’ neck languidly. He sloppily tongues away from Pallas’ mouth and over to his ear, leaving a wet trail that cools quickly against his cheek and Pallas giggles again, but cut short when Maiandros nibbles gently at an earlobe. 

It’s not really Pallas’ favoured place to be kissed, so he squirms with a loud, impatient huff of breath, angling his head awkwardly and pulling on Maiandros’ hair. Pallas urges him onto his neck and it’s a thousand times better, so he throws his head back to give him space to work, letting out a long moan at the rough drag of lips on his skin. Maiandros’ hands have wandered down to Pallas’ ass, squeezing his cheeks through his rucked up chiton, and every so often pulling them apart. It makes Pallas gasp each time, and grip tighter on the hair under his hands, and Maiandros distracts him even further by bending more and attaching his mouth to a nipple. Pallas blearily lowers his head, opening his eyes to seek a visual for how heavenly it feels, slick tongue and lips around the hardening bud, but when he does, his eyes catch on something else.

There’s a figure just down the hall, leaning against the wall with a nonchalant hand propped on his hip, and Pallas is just about to alert Maiandros to their sudden spectator when it hits him. The figure is Lazar, only unrecognizable through Pallas’ haze of drink and lust, but it’s him all the same, with his smirking mouth and sharp eyes. He feels a rush of arousal go straight to his dick, and moans lowly, running a soft, possessive hand over Maiandros’ shoulder. Maiandros groans back, one hand coming up to tug the other side of Pallas’ chiton out of the way, switching nipples. Pallas lets out uncontrollably heavy, panting breaths at the feeling of both the lips on his chest and Lazar’s gaze boring into him. He sees Lazar raise the hand not currently on his hip, and wrap it around his own throat, dragging it down his chest at an unhurried pace. Lazar’s hand reaches his own cock, presumably straining against his laced Veretian trousers, and Pallas feels himself become impossibly hot, afraid to even blink for missing anything in this moment, but also barely keeping his eyes open from the divine pleasure of it. His cock hasn’t even been touched yet but he already feels so close, as if just one more precarious push will tumble him over, making him come all over himself. He thinks raggedly about doing just that, and then having someone, either Maiandros or Lazar, or even, impossibly, _both_ licking up his spent come and wrapping their lips around him until he’s hard and straining again.

The image of that happening in the undeniably public space of this hallway, in the middle of the palace, backed onto a courtyard fills Pallas with an overwhelmingly complex feeling of want and embarrassment, the need for release and the need for privacy. He can’t help but adore the feeling of being seen by Lazar, not even touched directly, but watched in this way. He wonders, with another rush of heat to his cock at the thought, if Lazar had known he was there in the gardens that day, if he’d been pleasuring his lover for the benefit of both him _and_ Pallas. The Lazar in front of him now has his own fingers curling into his mouth, and a strong grip on the front of his trousers, and Pallas is helpless but to imagine having those hands on him, feeling the phantom touch of –

Maiandros suddenly bites down unusually hard on his nipple and Pallas clutches at him, gasping out an ‘ _ah, fuck._ ’ He looks down to see Maiandros with a devilish grin that Pallas has come to associate with a very different face. 

“Maybe we should find that bed soon, yes?” says Maiandros, and Pallas smiles shakily at him, an unvoiced agreement. Maiandros doesn’t take his hands off him, which Pallas appreciates fully; his balance is still off and his legs are weak from the tidal wave of arousal he’s had washed over him. Pallas does surreptitiously peek around Maiandros’ arm to see if Lazar is still there, but all trace of him has vanished. He’s not sure what he would’ve done if he’d remained, whether he’d stop to invite him along to bed, or try to return his provocative looks, but then Maiandros is clasping his hand again, and Pallas tries to clear his mind of anything other than the beautiful man in front of him.

#

Pallas doesn’t really mean to see Lazar as much as he does over the next couple weeks. It seems like the man is nearly always around every corner, him and the day’s partner of choice, and Pallas is struck silent and still every single time, helpless to do anything but observe. The thing that’s changed, now, after the wrestling lesson, and that time with Maiandros, is that Pallas is much less afraid of being caught. He lets his gaze linger even longer, in fact, daring Lazar to perform these acts on all these people and satisfy Pallas with a look at the same time. 

He doesn’t quite know what kind of game it is that they’re playing with each other. If Lazar had been Akielon, maybe Pallas would have approached him by this point, holding his hand and pulling him into a vacant room. He’s not sure what it is, but there’s something about Lazar that leaves Pallas flushed and flustered, shocked like a rabbit without cover. Lazar makes him want to continue in this coyness, with flexing muscles and heavy-lidded looks, glances over his shoulder. He makes Pallas want to look as debauched as possible, like the partners Lazar leaves around the palace, just to show him what he could be like, too. 

This naturally evolves into a renewed and active interest in making time for dalliances with old lovers, practically pleading with them to leave as many bites as they want to, grip as tight as possible, don’t worry about keeping it inside the hemmed bounds of a chiton. Just the same, Pallas marks his partners up in return as well, and he would laugh at himself if he were not so caught up with it all; it’s like they’re marking their territory, but in this strange, flirtatious, seductive fashion. 

Sometimes he’ll find that one of his partners is already sporting a particular bruise on their neck, or a bite on their breast, and Pallas will only smile to himself and apply his own teeth overtop. Sometimes he’ll pretend that it’s Lazar’s own lips he’s biting into, in some indirect way, through whichever lover happens to be between them like this. He hopes that Lazar finds Pallas’ marks the same way, and treats them with the same reverence, brings about the same satisfaction. It adds a heavy layer of _something_ over every interaction they each have, one that ends up falling on everyone else they both touch, too. 

Aktis seeks him out in the baths after drills again one evening. The Exalted had been spectator to the last half of their practice, and the thrill of his observation had made all of them, not just Pallas, pick up their tired feet again, regain some precision through the fatigue.

“You’ve been busy lately. Are those your bruises on Doreios now?” Aktis can’t keep a straight face. Pallas huffs a laugh; Doreios is in the same corner of the baths as usual with his own friends, and sports a conspicuous apricot-sized bruise on the crease between his thigh and ass. Pallas thinks he must not attempt to sit down a lot.

“No, I wouldn’t with him,” says Pallas politely. Aktis grins.

“It’s the voice, right? The timbre must worsen even more in the throes of passion, I reckon. Ah, but I know _that’s_ your work,” he says, pointing over to Theoros where he’s lathering soap in his hair. His raised arms allow the smattering of small bite marks below his armpit, on the very side of his pectoral to be seen. Pallas blushingly admits that it’s his doing, but also knows there’s a bite just under Theoros’ ear that Lazar put there. He smiles. Aktis catches it.

“I knew it!” he cries, splashing the water. Pallas doesn’t bother trying to hide his expression, but does sink lower in the water, letting the heat soothe his aching shoulder. Aktis settles beside him.

“Is there some competition I don’t know about?” he says in an uncharacteristically hushed voice. “You know, between you and the Veretian who’d been making the rounds before?” Aktis raises his eyebrows.

Pallas is about to deny it. It’s never been a competition between them; they’d never gone over rules or set up stakes, or kept track of anything. Fuck, they’ve barely even spoken to one another except for the risqué wrestling lesson. But something strikes him again at the thought, that this may be a game, but Pallas had never considered how it might end. There would never be a winner, but what happens at the call of a draw?

He mulls everything over for the rest of the bath, and then the rest of the night, and for the rest of the week, as well. He only sees Lazar once in this time, when he and a small phalanx of his cohort turn a corner just in time to see him leading a servant into another corridor by her hand. Pallas doesn’t have the permission to break from his group right now, and even if he did – it’s only been men up until now. The entirety of drills that come after don’t do much to distract him from the thought swirling around in his head: ‘ _Have I lost?_ ’

The number and frequency of Pallas’ lovers dwindle basically back to what they were before all of this mess. Even Aktis notices his less enthusiastic mood; Pallas throws himself fully into training and practice and wrestling with fervour, trying to beat the feeling of loss from his body with physical exertion. He’s barely persuaded by his friends to attend the next big feast, not bothering to de-tangle his hair or wear the nicest of his sandals as would be expected. 

He’s refraining from drinking too much, not seeing the point in it, nibbling on grapes and lounging sullenly on a low seat when he feels someone sneak up behind him. Before he can turn, a hand caresses his shoulder and a breath whispers in his ear.

“You look too sad for such a fun party.” Pallas whips around to see Lazar and his usual pursed, smirking lips. He raises an eyebrow expectantly. Pallas doesn’t know what to say. He makes a quick decision in his head before tossing the grapes onto the closest table and getting to his feet. Lazar smiles knowingly, and Pallas can only blush and grab his arm to wind their way through the feast attendees towards the door that leads out to the East hallway.

Lazar whirls Pallas around by his own grip and pins him to the wall in a surprisingly elegant move. Through the power of sheer annoyance, Pallas manages to shove and spin simultaneously, so that their position is reversed, his hands pushing Lazar roughly into the stone of the wall. Pallas preens at his capture of this infuriating man and his infuriating smile, his sharp looks and teasing touches.

“So that’s how you like it –” Lazar starts, but Pallas has had enough, and he crushes their lips together. A heavy hand grabs onto the side of his chiton in desperation as they kiss, and Pallas nearly groans into the open mouth under his, sliding their tongues together. Lazar pulls back to bite down on Pallas’ lower lip and sneaks a hand under the material to thumb at Pallas’ nipple. He takes a gasping breath at the feeling of it, dragging his own hands down to Lazar’s chest, but the Veretian style of his jacket means that he won’t feel the skin there any time soon. A rough hand grabs at his hair and twists fingers through the curls, yanking from the roots to make Pallas keen.

He’d thought the vexing dance of their bites and glances and brief, oiled touches would end when they finally came together, but Pallas can see now that it was only an extended preparation for what was clearly the main event. The game’s conclusion was always meant to be _this_ , the wrapping of a hand around his ass, the twist of his nipple between fingers, the bites on the short stubble of his jaw. He’d been thinking about what Lazar’s hands could do with him for so long now, and now he wants all of it, all at once.

The hand at his ass flips the fabric of his chiton up to bare Pallas to the chilled air of the empty hallway. Pallas leans forward and down, so that their chests rub together – Lazar’s hand on his nipple trapped between them – and begins a series of bites down Lazar’s neck. 

“Are we finally going to fuck,” says Lazar, and Pallas finds himself grinning into the skin before him at the coarseness in the Veretian’s voice. Lazar’s finger trails quickly down the crease of his ass to press against his hole.

“ _Yes,_ ” Pallas moans. 

Lazar’s head falls forward to mouth at Pallas’ shoulder as his hands work him into a frenzy. They don’t have any oil with them, but the harsh friction of his fingers against the skin of Pallas’ balls and perineum feel good enough for now, especially combined with the points of Lazar’s teeth working into his shoulder. Pallas gains enough coherence to bring a hand down to Lazar’s crotch, pressing and squeezing the hardness he finds underneath the laces. The hands disappear from Pallas’ chest and ass, and he lets out a whine at their disappearance. Lazar makes a noise of impatience himself, trying to open the front of his trousers as efficiently as possible. Pallas scrapes his teeth against his own lip when he eventually sees Lazar’s erection, long and smooth and arcing up deliciously from the patch of brown hair. Pallas notices for the first time the contrast in their skin, how beautiful a bruise might look on the paleness of Lazar’s hips or stomach or neck. He reaches for Lazar’s cock with an eager hand, but is intercepted.

“Turn around,” he says, and Pallas does so with only a little reluctance, which diminishes completely when he’s pulled back into Lazar’s chest, his stiff cock nestling against the cleft of Pallas’ ass. They both take a second to breathe heavily at the feeling of it, and Lazar’s hands run lazily over Pallas’ chest and stomach, calluses catching on his skin in they way they could not with the wrestling oil. Lazar attaches his lips to the back of Pallas’ neck and when he starts rolling his hips, using the leverage of his shoulders against the wall, Pallas can only make a noise of relief when a hand slips down and flicks up the front of his skirt.

“ _Ah, putain_ , you’re gorgeous,” Lazar murmurs. Pallas raises an arm to find Lazar’s hair behind him and grab on. “Bared to the world for me, and so _hard_.” He punctuates the sentence with a deliberate squeeze around Pallas’ cock. He comes to the slow, intoxicating realisation that he _is_ open and bare like this, facing the rest of the hallway, the feast continuing in the room behind them. If anyone saw them like this, Lazar’s abbreviated thrusts against his balls, his firm hand stroking Pallas’ cock – his length twitches in Lazar’s grip.

“I know, wouldn’t it be delicious,” Lazar purrs. Pallas lets out a breathy gasp at a well-aimed nudge, paired with the press of his finger on the underside of Pallas’ cock. He mindlessly covers his own mouth with his palm until Lazar makes a _tsk_ of disapproval. “Let everyone hear how good you are,” he says.

All Pallas can do from then on is just clutch to the hair between his fingers, rubbing back into the hardness behind him, then forward into Lazar’s tantalizing hand. At some point the rhythm speeds up, precisely when a sudden ruckus emanates from around the corner, closer to the entrance of the feast. The thrill of possibility brings Pallas excruciatingly near to the edge, but it’s Lazar’s final, stinging bite to his neck that makes him come undone. His stomach tenses hard underneath Lazar’s supporting hand around him and Pallas clamps his eyes shut before he can see his own come drip to the floor. 

It takes a minute for him to release his grip on Lazar’s head and recover the strength in his legs, and it’s only when he turns around in Lazar’s arms that he realizes the man is still achingly hard. Pallas kisses him firmly on the mouth and smiles when he pulls back.

“Let’s find a room,” Pallas says out of habit, and then makes a face at himself. He did just come to the idea of getting caught in public.

“You Akielons and your _rooms_ ,” says Lazar with a joking groan. Pallas wipes a lock of sweaty hair from his forehead, clasps Lazar’s hand, and laughs as they set off down the corridor.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr at brigitttt (personal) and/or brigittttoo (rarely used side with writing), and newly on twitter @brigitttt_ . Comments are much appreciated, thank you for reading!


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